


DYSPHORIA

by hidden__lore



Category: Star Trek: The Next Generation
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Dark, Alternate Universe - Horror, Androids, Angst, Body Horror, Body Modification, Dark, Dark Data (Star Trek), Data's Emotion Chip (Star Trek), Dead Dove: Do Not Eat, Despair, Disturbing Themes, Emotional Manipulation, Episode: s06e26-s07e01 Descent Parts 1-2, Graphic Description of Corpses, Guilt, Horror, Human Experimentation, Lore (Star Trek) should be his own trigger warning, Non-Consensual Body Modification, Panic Attacks, Psychological Horror, Psychopathology & Sociopathy, Suicidal Thoughts, Torture, Violent Thoughts
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-11
Updated: 2021-03-15
Packaged: 2021-03-18 13:35:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,263
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29983653
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hidden__lore/pseuds/hidden__lore
Summary: "He grimaces, one second, two, then he screams, a raw, broken shriek of agony. He looks up sightlessly at Data--his friend, his attacker, his companion, his killer--and then wheezes violently, throat raw. His breaths are labored and frantic, his body shuddering underneath the restraints."ORData's ethical subroutine doesn't reboot in time.
Comments: 13
Kudos: 16





	1. TO SIGHTLESSLY SEE

He grimaces, one second, two, then he screams, a raw, broken shriek of agony. He looks sightlessly up at Data--his friend, his attacker, his companion, his killer--and then wheezes violently, throat raw. His breaths are labored and frantic, his body shuddering underneath the restraints.

The procedure is turning to the final stage, and Geordi only knows a raw, primal, animalistic fear. A sixty percent chance of death, the preferrable option, for the latter is to live life as a mechanical slave to Lore's manipulations--just like Data, if he can even be called that now. The machine before him may as well just be Lore with unfettered access to Data's memories. It has to be. This isn't Data. This isn't Data. There is no way. Geordi hopes it isn't Data, he really does, for the alternative is that his friend is still somewhere in there, manipulated into murder, broken and inverted into someone else. Geordi hopes it isn't Data, because he knows Data will never forgive himself. He gives one last mirthless laugh, one last attempt to appeal to any humanity that Data may have and-

"I am ready to irradiate your existing brain cells."

Geordi doesn't want to die. (Geordi doesn't want to lose himself either.)

Data reaches for a switch to the left of the room.

They say before death your life flashes before your eyes, but all Geordi can see is Data in his mind's eye. Data's head tilt, Data's curious face, Data's cat, Data's daughter... and then all he can see is Lore.

A flick of a switch.

Agony-

Pain-

Nothing...

Data pivots and peers at the console, golden irises awaiting the machine's output. One second, two, three... Another moment passes, another moment too long for the experiment to be a success, and he swivels away from the console dissatisfied, an irate feeling slithering through his metal ribs, followed by a hollow sense of... something. He tells himself it's due to his wasted time. Seething now, he turns and leaves the room without a glance at his friend's corpse. The door closes with a slam, and with it the lights dim, shrouding the room in darkness once more.  
  
Approximately two-point-six-five more seconds pass.  
  
The console, if one were able to interpret Borg code, would clearly read one thing: **SYSTEM STARTUP INITIATED**  
  
In the corner of the room, the diagnostic lights of the positronic brain begin to illuminate the room in a vibrant rainbow, first red then orange, yellow, and green.  
More messages appear on the console, starting as a trickle of notifications, then a violent onslaught of text-  
  
 **RUNNING SYSTEM DIAGNOSTIC:**  
(Something is wrong. Something is terribly, horribly wrong. Geordi can't quite place it, though. Perhaps it's because his headache is gone. Perhaps it's because the world is dark, darker than it was before, darker than blindness, as if he never had eyes to begin with. Perhaps it's because his memories are resurfacing almost instantly with a sense of unease. Or, perhaps, it was a twisted amalgam of all three.)  
  
 **1% COMPLETE**  
(A pause, a realization, and then: "Where the hell am I?")  
  
 **5% COMPLETE**  
("What is this place?" Dread.)  
  
 **10% COMPLETE**  
("Am I dead?" Horror.)  
  
 **15% COMPLETE**  
("Oh no... no- no- no..." He is panicking now, and if he could still breathe he would be hyperventilating madly like a sick animal. Realization--it strikes through his mind like a bolt of lightning. This cannot be real. This cannot be real. This cannot be rea-)  
  
 **20% COMPLETE**  
("He did not, he did not, he did not!")  
  
 **25% COMPLETE**  
("I'm not a-" Geordi chokes out.)  
  
 **30% COMPLETE**  
("No, no, no-" He frantically tries to reach his face into his hands, only to find that he has none.)  
  
 **40% COMPLETE**  
("Data! Shit -- Data?" Geordi cries into the darkness, but there is no response. Nothing but a mechanical whirring behind his ears which he can't shake.)  
  
 **99% COMPLETE**  
("Data, what did you do-" he cries, but his voice distorts into a mass of static in his hysteria. The whirring won't stop and it's driving him mad.)  
  
 **100% COMPLETE; SYSTEM DIAGNOSTIC COMPLETE (0.056 SECONDS EXAUSTED)**  
 **STATUS: NO ERRORS FOUND**  
If an engineer screams alone in a positronic brain, but there is nobody to hear him, did he scream at all?  
  
  
...  
  
  
 **SYSTEM STARTUP COMPLETE; PLEASE STAND BY.  
**  
"What did you do?!" he shrieks. **  
  
**

* * *

 **  
INTERNAL CHRONOMETER: 0.000 SECONDS PASSED**  
Anger is all Data feels.  
Apathy is all Data feels.  
  
  


"How are we going to know whether the pulse reboots Data's ethical program?"  
  
"We'll only tell that when we see his behaviour."

**  
INTERNAL CHRONOMETER: 0.098 SECONDS PASSED**  
Hatred, a blistering, all-consuming hatred runs through Data's circuits, clenching his fists and contorting his face into a facsimile of a predator's snarl, a maniacal expression which was out of place on his face.  
  
 **INTERNAL CHRONOMETER: 1.768 SECONDS PASSED  
** Satisfaction? Why wasn't he satisfied? He had just killed Geordi. Killed him. Killing was good. All he felt, though, was a clawing sense of wrongness, and that only made him angrier.  
  
 **INTERNAL CHRONOMETER: 2.026 SECONDS PASSED**  
Geordi. Who was Geordi to him? His slaver, his controller, the one who danced him about an endless circle of trying to be something he would never be. Geordi, Geordi, Geordi, Geordi... had always given him a sense of home. Something to look forward to. Something to-  
No. Geordi was not home; Lore was.  
  
 **INTERNAL CHRONOMETER: 3.082 SECONDS PASSED**  
The experiment did not work, he concludes. Perhaps he should attempt again, this time on Picard.  
A pause.  
  
 **INTERNAL CHRONOMETER: 4.023 SECONDS PASSED  
** That can be postponed, he reasons. There is no need for immediacy, their time is coming to an end anyways. His snarl deepens before his face returns to its flat nonchalance.  
  
  
He walks into the holding cell, though he cannot place why. There is no concrete need for him to be there. Picard and Troi's eyes meet his, cautious apprehension scrawled across their features. He pauses, and uncerimoniously says three words. He has no clue why his head isn't held high, or why he isn't even bothering to look proud of himself. Perhaps it was because he failed. Yes, he failed, the experiment was a failure.  
  
"Geordi is dead." -- and all Troi can sense from him is denial, denial, denial, denial, hate, hate, hate, rage, rage, rage, and then nothing, and like the flick of a switch, numbness consumes all.  
  


* * *

  
Geordi screams for an eternity. He screams for eons. He screams until the sun cools. He screams until his voice distorts and blends into the never ending background noise of whirring. He’s sure he must have been abandoned. He’s sure he must be in hell, but-  
  
 **INTERNAL CHRONOMETER: 6 HOURS, 42 MINUTES, 13.089 SECONDS PASSED** **  
**  
...but it’s only been six or so hours, a fact he’s painfully, acutely aware of. Geordi gives one last broken whimper in a strangled attempt to collect himself. He tries to redirect his thoughts, to something, anything-  
  
The Enterprise? (You’ll never see them again.)  
  
Data? (His image is forever tainted.)  
  
His family? (They’ll mourn your loss, you know. They’ll think you’re dead. Nobody is coming for you. Nobody ever will.)  
  
Geordi stops after that last thought, but he can still feel it rummaging around in the background of his mind, and he hates it, hates it, hates it-  
  
He wishes he could turn it all off and just rest, so he tries to think of something peaceful, something insignificant, something like a deep, dark void, or a sheet of blank paper. Perhaps he can fall asleep to it? He tries, he really does, but the thoughts don’t stop coming and he doesn’t feel tired, only restless and full of an insatiable energy, but he can’t move, can’t blink, can’t see, can’t twiddle his thumbs anxiously, can’t do anything but think-  
  
After a while, he starts thinking of other ways to pass the time; maybe, just maybe, he can fix this! Yeah, maybe he can get his body back, maybe go back and fix it all-  
  
You’re lying to yourself. Your body is gone, probably going to enter the stages of decay alone in some dark chamber, and there's nothing you can do, echoes the void with Geordi's own voice. He can only envision the bugs feasting on his future rot, and he wants to heave, wants to vomit so badly, but he has no body anymore and he can't, can't, can't, because this is so, so wrong.  
  
A millisecond passes by.  
  
(Am I a machine or a ghost?)  
  
He laughs, mirthlessly.  
  
(I'm going mad.)  
  
Another thought passes him by.  
  
Oh no.  
  
What if he’s just the first? What if there will be others? What if his friends are-  
  
A shiver runs up his ghost of a spine.  
  
...  
  
A mounting horror among the crew, and a scream that not a soul can hear.


	2. AND WE'RE HAUNTED BY THE GHOSTS WE KILLED [UNFINISHED]

**SYSTEM STARTUP INITIATED**  
(Data blinks once, then again, disoriented. He is not where he was before, in fact, he is in the brig, and his chronometer reads that he has been rendered inactive for precisely 32 minutes and 68.998 seconds. Unsettled but curious, he begins to review his more recent memory files for any source of error or motive.)  
(A pause.)

 **RUNNING SYSTEM DIAGNOSTIC:**  
(In the memory, he is standing over Geordi. He is standing over Geordi with a bundle of wires in one hand. In the other is some horrific instrument more suited to be used for a dissection than on anything alive.)

 **1% COMPLETE:**  
(No, Data breathes hopelessly, I did not! Please, please, I did not!)

 **20% COMPLETE:**  
(He wants the memories to stop so, so bad, but they refuse in mockery of his sanity.)

 **25% COMPLETE:**  
(He isn't sure what is the worst part of it all: Geordi's pained whimpers and pained attempts at reason, or the emotional overlay of the memory. Hatred. Jealousy. Humor--he had thought it was funny, funny to hear him scream, funny to hear his attempts to bring him back, funny to- He wants to scream so badly, because it is as if he is watching someone else in his skin, but he knows, he knows, deep down, that it was him. His laughter. His grins. His jokes. His hands, peppered with Geordi's blood-)

 **30% COMPLETE:**  
(Geordi died, his body stilling after one last burst of radiation, the memory tells him. Dead, gone. He has always known the textbook definition of the word 'death', but now he feels as if he's just discovering it for the first time. He feels empty, emptier than he ever had before.)

 **40% COMPLETE:**  
(He remembers shooting Lore down. He remembers being shot down himself and rendered immobile. He remembers collapsing limply, uselessly to the floor. He vaguely remembers being dragged to the brig in some strange limbo of awareness and oblivion, a dry, broken chuckle escaping his lips. He remembers.)

 **99% COMPLETE:**  
(He remembers everything, and he will never be the same.)

**100% COMPLETE; SYSTEM DIAGNOSTIC COMPLETE (0.048 SECONDS EXHAUSTED) STATUS: NO ERRORS FOUND**   
**[DEBUG: FILE D://ethcl_.subrt HAS BEEN FULLY RESTORED]**

...and he wants to scream, so he does, molten golden eyes darting around the room in a frenzied panic only to meet the counselor's eyes.  
(Failure.)  
  
He can't keep the contact though, so he looks away. His eyes linger on the floor for 2.067 seconds as he processes his own despair, and then he locks eyes with the captain.  
(Betrayal.)  
  
And the thoughts of death and destruction and satisfaction won't go away. He could kill them so easily, and it would feel so, so... wrong. (Wrong, but also very right.)  
He stops that train of thought there. No, he will not. Those are not his feelings. Those are not his desires.  
(But they are your actions, yes? You would have killed them if it were not for that subroutine of yours? Lore is gone, dead, dismantled. You made sure of it! These feelings are yours, yours and yours alone.)  
  
Instead of arguing with himself, he anxiously leaps to his feet at once in a manner more mechanical than natural, all resemblances and facsimiles of human movement abandoned in his frenzy. The crew jumps at his sudden unnatural jerkiness and he internally cringes. He needs movement, needs something to keep himself together, but the thoughts keep racing and will not stop. Finding himself with no room to run from his misdeeds, he slams himself against the wall and slides back uselessly to the ground.  
  
He wants to scream, wants to cry, wants to-  
"When I said I wanted..." he cuts himself off with low, dial-tone whine as his voice distorts with emotion, "to feel."  
  
He looks around again and settles on a patch on the ground, another bout of rage consuming his systems, and he wants to smash everything around him to pieces and then keep going, going, going until there is nothing but dust on his mangled hands-  
  
"I never asked for this."  
  
He settles for clamping his hands into fists, balling them together until the machinery locks in rebellion. He is so, so, angry, so, so hurt and so, so broken, and he wants to destroy everything in the room, but he can't, because his feelings are not his, not his, not his-  
  
(You know what you want.)  
  
He's not sure what he wants anymore. He's not sure of anything anymore. He is sure of one thing though.  
  
He reaches behind his neck as if to grapple with an invisible noose, and with a click his world flickers and goes black.  
  
 **SYSTEM SHUTDOWN COMPLETE**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> NOTICE: THIS CHAPTER IS UNFINISHED.  
> THIS CHAPTER IS UNFINISHED.  
> THIS CHAPTER IS UNFINISHED.  
> I CANNOT STRESS THIS ENOUGH.
> 
> I'll be adding more later this week.

**Author's Note:**

> Hey, hey!  
> I literally wrote this on my phone during my free time at school. (I'll be back to edit it very soon.)
> 
> EDIT: I changed some things since then, including the chapter name. Please let me know if you see any additional errors; I'd be so happy if you did. 
> 
> I am secretly a vampire that feeds on reviews and constructive criticism. Please leave your thoughts or I shall starve. :P


End file.
